Arcosanti Changes Leadership

Italian-born architect Paolo Soleri officially retired as president and CEO of the Cosanti Foundation, which he founded with his late wife, Colly, in 1956. Created to promote architectural education and mainly to build and grow Arcosanti, the foundation now will be led by Jeff Stein, AIA. Stein, former dean of Boston Architectural College, was elected president by Cosanti’s Board of Trustees and will move to Arizona to assume his post in September. “Our job now is to move Arcosanti forward, to honor Paolo's legacy, your ongoing good work, and the work of 8,000 others who have helped to build and grow this place over the past 40 years,” Stein states in a letter to Arcosanti staff, students, and volunteers.

The site of architectural pilgrimages, environmental education, and artistic events, Arcosanti was built by Soleri in 1970 to embody his concept of arcology, or architecture plus ecology. The complex occupies 25 acres of a 4,000-acre natural preserve in the high desert north of Phoenix. Soleri’s ideal city of the future, Arcosanti hosts students of all backgrounds and fields for its monthlong workshops on building techniques and the arcological philosophy. According to the project’s mission statement, Arcosanti “is a model urban environment that is striving to reduce humankind's ecological impact on the earth.”